Automated telephone systems are in widespread use among users such as telemarketing, credit collecting and reservation services. Users of such system desire to optimize system performance by attempting to ensure nearly 100% operator productivity while minimizing the number of calls which are placed into a hold queue while waiting for an available operator. This concern arises from the fact that customers who are placed on hold will at some point hang up and be lost.
Several prior art systems and methods have been developed to prioritize the order in which calls placed on hold are answered. However, all have been met with limited success. Early systems and methods include prioritizing the on-hold calls based upon the telephone number dialed. For example, long distance callers who are on hold may be handled before on-hold local callers. Another method involves prioritizing the on-hold calls strictly by age or the length of time the call has been placed on hold. However, this method fails to recognize the non-uniformity in the willingness of customers to remain on hold based upon the length of time the caller has been on hold. For example, a customer who has been on hold for 30 or 40 seconds may not be more apt to hang up then a customer who has been on hold for 10 seconds or less. Another example is that customers are more apt to hang up when a message is played during the hold interval. Additionally, such non-uniformity in hold tolerance will vary and change from user to user and from call campaign to call campaign.
In order to address the above-identified concerns, more sophisticated hold queue management systems were developed. An example of one such sophisticated system is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,278,898, which issued on Jan. 11, 1994 to the assignee of the present application and which is incorporated herein by reference. The '898 patent discloses a system including a method for managing calls on hold connected to an automated telephone system by allowing the system to prioritize the calls on hold according to selectable, dynamically controllable priority criteria. This system places connected calls on hold and a call record corresponding to each of the calls placed on hold is inserted into a hold queue. Each of the call records includes at least a first portion identifying the connected call and a second, call prioritizing portion, which includes predetermined indicia from which call prioritizing may be accomplished. A hold queue prioritizer prioritizes the call records in the hold queue utilizing the predetermined indicia and established a number of call priority categories.
Like all of the prior art systems, even this sophisticated, prior art hold queue management system suffers from a significant drawback; namely, it relies solely upon information received from the call itself for prioritization purposes. It fails to take into account the fact that modern automated telephone systems may have the capability of accessing a wealth of information regarding customers that may be stored in a customer database. This information may be vital to the proper prioritization of a telephone call that is placed in a hold queue.
Accordingly, there is a need for a system and method of prioritizing telephone calls in a hold queue that accesses a customer database, retrieves information about the customer that is relevant to the prioritization of a telephone call and prioritizes the calls in the hold queue based, at least in part, upon the information it retrieves from the customer database.